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Month: April 2014

Did yees know that auld Nelson Mandela over dere in Africa was imprisoned by the evil aparthate regime for blowing up a pylon? And we all know what happened to your man after that – the Nobel Peace Prize and getting the title of world champion of the twentieth century. Makes youse think dunnit?

Some of ye lads might be startin to tink we have our own evil regime right here.

I was just after seeing the Mandela fillim “The Long Walk to Freedom” and it showed how he was a lawyer, and tried to live within the law, and followed the rules, but after a while he realised that the laws were so evil that it was impossible to follow dem and be a good person at the same time – one had to choose between good and evil. He chose good and so blew up that pylon.

So then I was thinking what is the law here? The law is called The Strategic Infrastructure Act, and it fecks over the previous planning laws altogether. It says that when the government call something a strategic infrastructure, all the doors fly open and they just walk right in, usually over the dead bodies of good and honest Irish citizens. The same law says that these strategic infrastuctures don’t need to go to the elected County Council first for Planning Permission, they go straight to An Bord Pleanala, and of course we know that the ABP are full of government appointed hoors, falling over themselves to get a sniff of Enda’s backside. ABP now means Arse-Bandit Plonkers.

Me being a blocklayer I thought I must have got this wrong. As a youngfella I was taught that we lived in a democracy. A democracy means the citizens get the last word. Peig couldn’t help me, so I thought I would see for myself. I went up to Portlaoise on the train and got hold of the file on the ABP decision to allow EirGrid to build a substation in Coolnabacca, which is in the Laios-Kilkenny area. The file was thick and took me all day to read it, there were so many representations from the people of the area. They all felt new to the touch – like they were never read before.

Jaysus wept. They call it a sub-station. There is nothing sub about it – it’s a feckin Super-station with 17 bays which means 17 high-power (400kV) lines comin in: Connections to a lot of wind farms, any fool can see that, it’s as plain as da tits on a monkey.

Eirgrid said it was for the upgrade and extension of a 110 kV line to Kilkenny and the ABP agreed with them. Evidence was led by the local people that it was to connect lots of wind farms – the evidence was a letter from Eirgrid in 2009, where the Project Manager says “the substation is for the future connection of renewables (windfarms)”. That seemed pretty clear to me: Eirgrid were talking bollocks with their story of a line extension, but that was ignored by your man from the APB.

When they realised their Environmental Impact Statement was dodgy, Eirgrid asked to amend it there and then in the hearing, without giving the people time to respond, and your man from APB allowed them, saying it was ‘within his remit to do so’. Your remit needs a refit methinks. In the bad old days we’d be lookin for the brown envelope – but this is just too daft to be bent, and having shit for brains is not a crime.

Anybody, even a blueshirt with half a brain, can see that feckin Eirgrid will use this super-station to connect the wind-farms in the Counties of Kilkenny, Laois, probably Wexford – 17 wind farms is a lot of wind farms – they said so in their letter. Hundreds of good folk trusted An Bord Pleanala to see through this obvious lie and banjax the whole mess, but the ABP just became part of that lie and let it go ahead.

This is when good people, who have obeyed the law their whole life, come to that point where your man Mandela was at when he said – the law is fecked-up evil, I cannot stand by and let it go on. You would understand if some yoke felt desperate enough to do something silly – please God that never happens. It is up to this regime to show the people it is not evil and stop this madness – now.

It was Tuesday the 15th, the day of The March on Leinster House. I was up to Dublin the night before as I knew tings would kick off early and I needed to be up front in the crowd and close to the speakers like. Hiding in plain sight they call it in those spy fillims. I knew the CCTV cameras around Leinster House would be working overtime scanning the crowd and the place would be sick with peelers. So I was in front of the crowd, with the stage hiding me from the cameras, and I had on the disguise that Peig and Saoirse made up for me – great craic the girls had in putting it together. I’m not going to tell yees or else it wouldn’t be a disguise now, wuddit?

Why the paranoia Paddy, you ask? The reason for that was that one of my mates in the guards was tellin me to watch my step as I was now on the wanted list. Not the official list like wanted dead or alive or anything like that cos I haven’t committed any crimes, not since I was a youngfella anyways. No, I was on that unofficial list sent around to each barracks cos I was pissing certain people off like, according to me auld segotia, anyways. To be honest we’re not that close anymore since he said no to putting a bug in Pat’s office – I mean, WTF I sez? If you can bug the Cabinet meetings, why not stick one in that gombeen’s office, I asks. Then we can find out which pylon corridor he’s chosen in Waterford. We could make some serious money at Paddy Power. But he wasn’t interested – Dublin coppers obviously do OK already.

Anyways, I came up on the train from Mullingar the night before, and checked into my hotel close to Leinster House, and kept low in my room – room service burgers, beer, and saucy movies, heaven I tell yees. The next morning I had to put on the disguise before I checked out. You should see your wan’s face at reception, but I paid cash and was out the door in the shake of a tail.

The people were everywhere, and it was grand altogether. Lots of smiley faces, and people shaking hands and asking “Where you up from?”. It was like a big family, and I mean big. I laughed at the RTE News later that night when they said ‘about 2000’, but sure that’s to be expected when Rabbitte is their boss – the Minister of MisCommunication – I stood next to a Gard with a head on him like your man Gleeson in the fillim and asked him about the numbers. He spoke into his radio, listened and told me, “there’s easy over ten thousand, close to eleven”.

I was moved up close to the stage. Another fellow next to the stage, Michael, told me he was a chef from a castle. Probably Malahide, but he didn’t say. Your man had a rucksack on his back and the guards were watching him, thinking of the Boston Marathon I’d wager. I whispered this in his ear and went over to tell the guards as well that it was all grand, your man was a chef just carrying fresh produce, and they relaxed. It’s amazing what a cuddly disguise can do to relax people. I’m going to suggest to Peig that maybe we try this outfit in the bedroom.

I was standing next to your man from the Pylon Alternative Alliance – Duggan? – who was busy telling me how he was organising everybody into a structure. I guess he wanted to be at the head of that structure, but then I wouldn’t know for sure. I asked him how could he be saying that pylons were the alternative? I said he should come and see my bungalow with the pylon in the back – pylons are the problem I sez, not the alternative. He didn’t seem to take me seriously, it might have been the disguise. My friend, you seem a straight-up bloke, I sez, so a word of advice. We have a common enemy – EirGrid and Fat Pat. The strength of the movement is the community – the People – listen to them, don’t tell them what to do, we have the cute hoors doing that already and God forbid you turn out to be another cute hoor. We are all singing from the same hymn sheet – let the people find their own voice, don’t tell them which song to sing, especially if it just happens to be your favourite song. This is a people’s movement, let the people rule. Like they do today, and those gombeens in Leinster house are sweatin cos of it.

I even know what its called now, I saw it on the letter to those Arbitration lawyers of EirGrid – participatory democracy. A mouthful sure, but delicious to the discerning palate, so my chef friend told me. I am sure thats how the Waterford groups are so strong, and leading the rest of the country by example – the people speak and the people govern – the leaders follow.

Jeanie Mac – it was like a who’s who of anti-pylon people – Tom McGurk, who is tall enough to step over the feckin pylon and a top man – he must be to speak over that Right Hook. Gerry Adams – with his own sign that he made in his office – ‘SF Against Wind’ – no mention of the undergrounding, but just connect the dots, Gerry. I spoke to a lovely lady from Mayo who had never been to a protest before but this was important she said – good woman yourself.

Of course there were loads of cute hoors looking for all the votes on offer – sure everyone is suddenly anti-pylon. Before you cast your vote just remember who was there from the beginning, fighting in the trenches. Your man Kieran Hartley will get my vote for sure – he was there from the start with the heroes from Comeragh Against Pylons in Kilmacthomas. I remember in the early days when Kieran travelled all the way up to Mullingar to speak to us, when we didn’t have a clue – well I did, having taken the thirty pieces of silver, but the people there didn’t have a notion what was going on and Kieran spoke to us and answered all our questions. Gas Man – he gets my vote for Europe.

A fellow in front was making a lot of noise and trying to stir things up – I saw the Carlow colours and thought he was a Hogan supporter – a Phil-istine – trying to start a fight maybe. The guards were watching him for a while as your man was foaming at the mouth and roarin fit to bust. When I got close and saw the Rasta colours I realised your man was there to support the hemp / biomass option and he was singing ‘Stir It Up ’, rather than just acting the eejit.

The speaker that impressed me the most was himself, Sean Cullinan. A bear of a man – he would be playing flank for Munster if your man Stander wasn’t so brilliant – but with the intellect of Einstein (and youse thought I was too thick to know these things. Remember I was two years in Maynooth, so I know all about Albert and his Theory of Serendipity). Sean was telling us how important it was for us to vote for the pylon candidates in the elections on 23 May. Forget party politics, vote for your anti-pylon candidates cos that is how we will kick Leinster House in the arse. Get our people into the European parliament to shout back at the wind lobby, get people onto your local Council to stop planning applications for more turbines. That is the way forward. People power.

And then I saw Midi. She was carrying an As Gaeilge sign COSC AR PYLONS. My fluffy disguise got me around the mountain men, but when I got to her my tongue was frozen and I sputtered out some jibber-jabber about elections. And how did she reply in that gorgeous voice of hers? She told me that her full name is Midi de Paor Walsh, it sounded like music when she said it, and she be standing in the Waterford Council elections. I told her that if I lived in Waterford I would vote for her, and maybe I could come down and live in her spare room? I wanted to speak forever but Midi was on a mission to save us, and next thing she was gone in a beautiful blur.

At that stage I was sweatin fit to melt. I needed scoops, loads of them. With one last look at my big happy family, I was gone, out of the disguise and away, back to Mullingar.

I was laughin at this Canadian video on the pylons (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E2JoYdo1kk8) which was on the CAP FB page, when your wan said the words that would send a shiver down a polar bear’s spine: ‘pylons cause erectile dysfunction’.

Kids might be readin dis, so witout goin into da small print, but since The Pylon came into me life, let’s just say when the Party Whip says in me head, “Let’s all be Upstanding for the Honourable Member Pylon”, I’m left in Alan Shatters, with a landslide Vote of No Confidence. Peig is very understanding, and holds me tight, but I know that she pretends to fall asleep.

I’m a blocklayer from Mullingar, how could this be happening to me, the Valentino of Viewmount?

And now watching this video, it all made sense – The Pylon would not be satisfied until it was the only thing left standing.

Is this what the Grid25 Project is really about with its male breast cancer and its limpdickness – to render the men of Ireland impotent? Did this explain why Pat Rabbitte was sounding more like me mammy every day, because he was becoming a mammy, along with the rest of us poor yokes?

I run outside, whipping out the jolly roger, not that it even fluttered in the breeze, and piss on The Pylon. Piss with all me might, spreading the feet wide so my patetick stream dont land on me shoes. “You won’t get me, yer giant metal hard-on, I’ll be baytin you, we’ll see who dysfunctions who, ye …, ye …, ye cockcrusher”.

A warm tongue slides across me neck, gently licking me ear. I freeze. The Pylon was seducing me, calling me over to The Dark Side. I felt meself letting go, strains of Michael Buble filled the air, I feel me mortified mickey starting to …Wha? The music stopped as the needle screeches over the vinyl. Wha? How can a pylon …?

T’was the auld horse – I be screamin at the top of me voice, and the aul dear did come up behind me and tried to comfort me. I hang onto her neck until me body stops shakin.

This blog has almost 35000 readers (EirGrid deny this) and I want you to use all those votes to decide who will be the biggest fool this April. You can choose from those groups and individuals who are already winners in their respective categories.
There are two categories – Group and Individual. You have two votes: One for Group and One for Individual.

GROUP

The Eoin O’Duffy award:
To Fine Gael, for reintroducing authoritarian rule into Ireland, and for closely following the Seven Principles of Fascism, as espoused by Benito Mussolini.

The JCB Award:
To Sinn Fein, for supporting all underground activity.

The Mike Tyson Award:
To Green Party, for having the neck to show their face again.

The Bertie’s Bowl Cute Hoor Award:
To Fianna Fail, for promising to call for a moratorium on Grid25, but never getting around to doing it.

The Anglo-Irish Bank Award:
To Labour, for being the biggest sell-outs for ill-gotten gain.

The St. Judas Iscariot Community Award
To EirGrid, for getting neighbours and communities talking again, even if it was about how much they feckin hate pylons.

INDIVIDUALThe Cunning Linguist Award:
To Pat Rabbitte, for talking out of both sides of his mouth and still being able to say ‘behave yourself’ at the same time.

The Diaspora Award:
To Enda Kenny, for chasing more Irish people from our shores than Cromwell and Thatcher combined.

The Dr Mengele Award:
To Finton Slye, for his contribution to medical science with his assertion that pylons are ‘completely safe’.

The Jenson Button Award:
To Eamon Ryan, for making the fastest U-turn in Irish political history.

The Eamonn Quinn Award:
To Brendan Halligan, for being able to run two businesses at the same time.

The ISPCA Award:
To Paudie Coffey, who needs love and a ‘forever home’ after taking a kicking on Friday night.

To vote send your e-mail to GridLink@eirgrid.com:
For Group – write ‘WTF’ and then the group’s name
For Individual – write ‘WTF’ and then the individual’s name.
Eirgrid will count the votes and never get back to you.
But vote anyway: GridLink@eirgrid.com